It was a British Army base for more than 150 years, now Ebrington could soon be home to an Irish language school
December 4, 2015
Plans have been put forward to open an Irish language secondary school on the site of a former British Army military base in Derry.
A group of prominent Irish language educationalists have created the plan which would see the new school open at Ebrington Square by September 2016 at the earliest.
The new school would be called An Bradan Feasa which translates as ‘The Salmon of Knowledge’.
A detailed proposal for the creation of the school will be sent to the Department of Education tomorrow.
If given the go-ahead, the plan would be to have an initial intake of around 20 pupils.
However, the committee involved in the project say they hope that the school could eventually cater for hundreds of pupils.
The school’s catchment area would be Derry and Strabane where there are currently four Irish language primary schools.
At present, there is no Irish language secondary school in Derry, although St Brigid’s College does offer some courses through the medium of Irish.
Philip Sheerin, a member of the committee behind the new school plans, described the lack of an Irish language secondary school in the local area as an ‘incredible educational disservice’ to children who wanted to continue their education through the medium of Irish.
Mr Sheerin stressed that the school would be non-denominational and said it would be a great opportunity to add vibrancy to the ongoing regeneration of Ebrington.
The development of the Ebrington site, which had been used as a military base since 1841, was taken over by regeneration company Ilex in 2003 after the site was vacated by the British Army.
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